


I Think I Need A New Heart

by qodarkness



Series: Love Is Like A Bottle Of Gin [10]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: 69 Love Songs, Another piece in the Theon/Sansa puzzle, F/M, Getting so very close, Love Is A Bottle Of Gin universe, Magnetic Fields, Modern AU, Robb Stark is a Gift, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27169666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qodarkness/pseuds/qodarkness
Summary: “You should have knocked, Theon,” said Sansa.The look Theon levelled at her was deeply unimpressed. “I’m not a savage, Sansa, even if I’m Ironborn," he said, huffily. “I knocked. I thought Robb said ‘come in’. Clearly I misinterpreted what he was actually saying.”
Relationships: Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Robb Stark/Margaery Tyrell, Theon Greyjoy & Robb Stark, Theon Greyjoy & Sansa Stark, Theon Greyjoy/Sansa Stark
Series: Love Is Like A Bottle Of Gin [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1581478
Comments: 4
Kudos: 37





	I Think I Need A New Heart

“You should have knocked, Theon,” said Sansa.

The look Theon levelled at her was deeply unimpressed. “I’m not a _savage_ , Sansa, even if I'm Ironborn,” he said, huffily. “I knocked. I _thought_ Robb said ‘come in’. Clearly I misinterpreted what he was actually saying.” He winced again at the memory and took another swig from the beer he was nursing. 

“I guess it shouldn’t really be surprising,” remarked Sansa. “Not since Margaery had to go back to Highgarden. I didn’t know if they’d make it work long distance but they seem to manage.”

Theon winced. “They’ve definitely found a way to work around the distance thing,” he said, taking another drink. “I just wish I didn’t have to walk in on it.”

Sansa laughed. “It couldn’t be that terrible, surely? I mean, it’s you, Theon. It’s not like you can pretend you haven’t seen a guy…” She paused. No matter how amusing she found the fact that Theon had had to retire to the fainting couch, it was still Robb they were talking about and he was her brother and she really didn’t want to think about Robb that way. “Doing that before,” she settled on.

Theon’s side-eye, she had to admit, was spectacular. “Of course I’ve seen a guy doing that before. Gods, I’ve done _that_ to guys before. But not _Robb_!”

Sansa looked at Theon for a moment. “Really?” she asked. “You’ve been best friends since you were, like, eight. You never… experimented?” She’d never gone that far with Jeyne, but there had been a little bit of practice kissing and maybe some very gentle pretend groping through clothes before they’d both dissolved into giggles and screaming and pretending it had never happened. She’d never really thought about it, but she’d kind of assumed that Robb and Theon had at least… well, near each other at the very least. In the same room, kind of thing.

But… “ _Not Robb!_ ” Theon reiterated. He stopped, drew his hand through his hair. “Even when I was young and stupid and fucking anything that moved because it was the only thing that made me feel…” He stopped, took another drink. “Robb just never… Robb doesn’t fuck.”

Sansa raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “I’m fairly certain what you just walked in on proves that Robb does, in fact, fuck.”

“Robb falls in love,” replied Theon. “You know he never… until Talisa. Until he fell in love. It’s how he’s always worked. He really is a hopeless romantic, Sans. I know we tease him about it a lot, but it sticks because it’s true. You’ve got to assume he rubbed one out on the regular, being a teenage boy, but he always thought about fucking like it was some magical, special thing that you only did with the woman you loved. Even my bad example didn’t manage to lead him astray.”

“Probably put him off the idea, if anything,” said Sansa archly and laughed at Theon’s offended look. “I was pretty young then, Theon, and didn’t really understand what you were doing, but even I didn’t think you were having fun. No matter what you tried to make it sound like.”

“Well, aren’t you Starks all so clever,” muttered Theon, somewhat sourly, but then he sighed. “It… made some shit hurt less, then.”

Sansa leaned back into the sofa, slipped her hand over Theon’s. “I know,” she said softly. “It’s not like I made the best choices either. But hey,” she said, brightly, “you get to actually finalise that dick-measuring contest you’ve been in with Robb forever.”

“SANSA!” wailed Theon. “I don’t want to think about it.” Putting his empty beer bottle down, he slumped dramatically downwards, burying his face in the pillow. “Besides,” he added, his voice muffled, “I always knew mine was bigger.”

“Really?” Sansa’s question was dryly amused, but Theon nodded into the pillow.

“Not actually boasting,” he said. “Just stating a fact. Also, I have had way too many beers if I’m talking about the size of my dick with you, Sansa.”

“Are you sure?” Sansa asked. “You’ve only had two. And that’s all that was in the fridge. Is that enough to deal with your terrible eyewitness experience?”

Theon turned his head, one expressive eye appearing under a mess of tangled bronze curls, looking at Sansa mournfully. “Probably not, actually,” he confessed and Sansa laughed.

“Stay there,” she said, and patted Theon’s shoulder gently. “I’ll go down the shop and get you some more. It’ll only take a couple of minutes.”

Sansa was true to her word and came back to find Theon awkwardly attempting to blend into the couch, in case, he told her, Robb had actually emerged from his room, in which case Theon wasn’t sure he wasn’t just going to flee into the street. He’d had a moment of panic, he told Sansa, when Arya had suddenly and loudly arrived, but she’d just glared at him and stomped off down to her room. No-one was sure if Arya technically lived with the rest of the family or with Gendry and Sam at Gendry’s flat; her time and her minimal possessions appeared to be evenly divided between the two of them. Despite Arya’s attempts at maintaining an air of mystery about the whole thing, everyone knew that Sam snored and that none of them in the tiny flat with too-thin walls could cook worth a damn. Catelyn’s not even slightly subtle habit of cooking her youngest daughter her favourite breakfast every time she joined them for the meal was, they all agreed, why Arya often stomped back into the house late at night and disappeared into her room to sleep in both peace and anticipation. 

Sansa gave Theon another beer, which he gratefully opened and drank a couple of mouthfuls from. “So how long has this Margaery thing been serious?” he asked. “I mean, I knew about it, right from when he first met her, but I didn’t realise it was quite so…” Theon made an expressive hand gesture. “So,” he finished lamely.

“I think they realised it when she was going back to Highgarden for her Masters. They thought they were all cool and it was just a fling and they weren’t taking it too seriously, because she was always going back and then she was going back and…” Sansa sighed. “You’re right, Theon. Robb falls in love. Head over heels. And she felt the same back. If it hadn’t been for security, I think Robb would have chased her plane down the runway trying to get her back. But he’s got his job here and Marg only needs to be in Highgarden for eighteen months, so they’re making it work on Skype and visits in holidays. That’s why he’s back home. They’re saving up to get a house together when she comes back. Mum said there wasn’t much point him paying rent on his flat when his room was right there waiting for him.”

“And you’re here because you broke up with Shae?” Theon asked. 

Sansa shrugged. “Graduated,” she said. “Got a job closer to here than to where my flat was. Shae running off with a old rich man was just…” she looked down at her hands, smiled suddenly, “really good timing, actually.”

“You didn’t… you’re not upset?” asked Theon, cautiously.

“I never loved her,” said Sansa softly. “Just like she never loved me. We liked each other a lot but… Shae never let me in. She was never, ever going to let me in.” She sighed, opened the second bottle of beer she’d brought out with her, took a swig. “She was safe, Theon. I was never going to love her, so she could never really hurt me. I needed that.”

Theon turned his head, looked at Sansa for a very long time, until she self-consciously began to play with her hair. “That makes sense,” he said finally. “Maybe…” and then he began to fiddle with the label on the beer bottle, tearing at its edges as he thought. “I think…” he finally said, slowly. “I think maybe all those girls… after Ramsay. I wanted to let them get close enough… but not too close. I didn’t trust… I didn’t trust anyone that wanted to get too close. I didn’t want to risk…”

“I get it, Theon,” said Sansa, softly and her hand reached out again, but this time when it curled over his, he turned his over, wrapped her fingers in his own. 

He leaned his head back against the couch, closed his eyes. “And you did it because you chose it. Because you knew what you were doing,” he said. “You’re not even the one who’s been in therapy for years, and you still knew what you were doing. You Starks really are too fucking smart,” he grumbled, not at all seriously. 

“But not very brave,” said Sansa and grinned and shrugged when Theon opened his eyes and half-glared at her. “You were brave. With Ros. I’m really sorry about… what happened at the end.”

“So am I,” said Theon, softly. “But she was right. She didn’t love me the same way I loved her. It wasn’t going to keep working for much longer.” He sighed. “I’ll never be sorry about what happened before the end, though. I had to learn to let someone in and I had to learn to let someone go and she taught me how to do both of those.”

“And it’s not like you wasted your time on Pyke,” said Sansa and Theon grinned suddenly. 

He had been quietly devastated when Ros had ended their relationship, a deep and desperate sadness that he’d mostly tried to hide away from everyone. In the end, Robb had phoned Yara and got her to come to Winterfell to try and rescue Theon from the hole he had fallen into. She’d arrived, taken one look at him and whisked him back to the Iron Islands on the next available plane.

“It was great,” he said. “Since Yara’s got her captain’s ticket, she been doing better and better. She owns about half the Iron Fleet now. She’s got to spend a lot of time running the business, so she doesn’t get as much time to go out on the boats, so she sent me out to be her eyes and ears while I was there. The sea’s a good place to be when everything is… It puts everything into perspective. _And_ … I didn’t fall overboard _or_ get bitten by a fish. So now I’ve got Ironborn cred. Yara’s pretty chuffed her little brother didn’t embarrass her as some kind of greenlander.”

“But you came back to Winterfell?” Sansa’s question was soft. 

Theon shrugged. “Pyke’s not home any more,” he said. “I’ve been here in the North too long now. I’ve got things to do here. Things to finish.” He took another drink, raised his beer at Sansa. “Still got to make you Queen of all Westeros.”

“Theon!” Sansa rolled her eyes at him, but he shook his head, waggling his finger at her. 

“No ‘Theon’ing at me,” he said. “I’m going to be the one saying ‘I knew she was going to be Queen since she was fourteen’ at people. I am going to be epic levels of smug at you when it happens. I’m going to be smug and irritating and incredibly annoying about it all and you’ll just have to put up with it, Sansa Stark.”

Sansa laughed then, squeezed his hand. “It’s nice,” she said. 

“What, me being smug and irritating?” replied Theon. “Yara says I’m really good at it, but I don’t think she thinks it's nice. Mostly really fucking annoying.”

Sansa gave him a look. “That you’ve always believed in me,” she said. “You always have, Theon. Even when both of us were fucking up our lives monumentally. You believed in me way more than I ever did.”

“One day I’ll convince you,” replied Theon. “You and Robb and, fuck, all of you. Fuck!” Theon suddenly shrank into the back of the couch as they heard a door open up above the stairs and footsteps. But they didn’t come down the stairs, instead heading to the bathroom. 

“I think Robb’s finished his call with Margaery,” said Sansa, very dryly. “Probably needs to go clean up.”

“Sansa!” Theon wailed again. “You’re a cruel woman.” He clutched at his chest. “Gods, my heart nearly came out of my chest. And you are not helping at all!”

“I’m not trying to help at all,” said Sansa, and the look she gave Theon was as smug and irritating as anything he had managed to aim at her. “I just want to make sure I’m there when you finally see Robb. I’ll bet you a gold dragon you’re going to make a dick joke at him. No matter how hard you try not to.”

“Fucking Stark,” muttered Theon but it was rueful. “You know me far too well, Sansa. Alright fine, I’ll make a dick joke at him. You know it, I know it, he knows it. I just have to make sure it’s the right dick joke.” He rubbed his chest again. “But I’m not ready to face him yet. I think I need a new heart. This one’s still trying to climb out.”

Sansa smiled at him suddenly, her eyes soft. “I don’t know,” she said. “I think I like the one you’ve got.”

They clinked bottles and settled back onto the couch to workshop dick jokes and Sansa didn’t mind at all that Theon’s fingers stayed firmly interlaced with her own. 

**Author's Note:**

> The last piece of the puzzle before Love Is Like A Bottle Of Gin. There will be more after it, but I wanted to get this one done before I got back to Ghost of Pyke. This was just a joy to write - I love the Theon and Robb dynamic even if they don’t actually appear on the screen together. 
> 
> Lyrics to I Think I Need A New Heart
> 
> Time stands still  
> All I can feel is the time standing still  
> As you put down the keys  
> And say don't call me please  
> While the radio plays  
> "I think I need a new heart" ohhh  
> "I think I need a new heart" ohhh  
> You've lied too  
> But it's a sin that I  
> Can't tell the truth  
> Cause it all comes out wrong  
> Unless I put it in a song  
> So the radio plays  
> "I think I need a new heart"  
> Just for you  
> "I think I need a new heart"  
> Cause I always say I love you  
> When I mean turn out the light  
> And I say let's run away  
> When I just mean stay the night  
> But the words you want to hear  
> You…  
> When I mean turn out the light  
> And I say let's run away  
> When I just mean stay the night  
> But the words you want to hear  
> You will never hear from me  
> I'll never say "happy anniversary"  
> Never stay to say "happy anniversary"  
> So I think I need a new heart ohhh  
> I think I need a new heart ohhh  
> I think I need a new heart ohhh  
> I think I need a new heart ohhh  
> Give me time


End file.
